Priority One – Payroll Shift Correction

The payroll shift correction from the Fiscal Year 2005 budget was inadvertently omitted from the Fiscal Year 2006 base budget. The Department’s Fiscal Year 2006 amended budget includes the following request in new state dollars to cover the cost of the payroll shift correction:

*Please note that the correction does not eliminate the payroll shift for the Department, but brings the percentage more in line with all other state agencies (see chart below).

Priority Two – Capital Outlay Request

Priority Three – Carryover Funding

The Department will pursue legislation during the 2006 legislative session that will allow each technical college to carry forward certain funds from fiscal year to fiscal year, including continuing education and technology fees as well as revenue generated through tuition.

The technical colleges have averaged a combined surplus of approximately $440,000 a year for the past four years. These numbers include state funds, tuition revenue and continuing education fees. The annual state appropriations for the corresponding four-year period have exceeded $275 million. The lost revenue generated through the surplus, which is less than two-tenths of a percent of the Department’s State appropriation, would be more than offset by the reduced time spent in determining the surplus by the state auditors. Furthermore, the ability to carry forward tuition and continuing education fees from year to year will allow the colleges to plan for significant swings in state appropriations that have historically hampered their ability to serve students during times of scarce public resources.

Priority Four – Maintain Level Funding in Fiscal Year 2007 Budget for the Technical Colleges, Adult Literacy and Quick Start

The Department’s Fiscal Year 2006 budget request was based on a two-year plan to utilize the current year’s enrollment growth funds, along with a tuition increase and a new student fee, in order to implement special initiatives. We intend to carry that plan into Fiscal Year 2007:

1. Produce graduates in strategic industries and businesses as defined by the Governor’s Commission for a New Georgia. The technical colleges will produce 2,580 graduates in health and eldercare, logistics and transportation, energy and environment, aerospace, agribusiness, and life sciences.

2. Identify and implement successful strategies that will reduce the dropout rates for middle and high school students. The plan will focus primarily on 8th, 9th and 10th graders by assessing career readiness and promoting occupational awareness and development, while preparing 11th and 12th graders for the transition to post-secondary education.

3. Create a Center for Manufacturing Excellence at Lanier Technical College, which will provide a state-of-the-art training facility to showcase Georgia’s ability to meet the advanced training needs of highly specialized manufacturing in the 21st century.

4. Complete the final year of a three year phase-in to transfer governance of Gwinnett Technical College from the Gwinnett County Board of Education to the state system of technical colleges.

5. Reduce the number of part-time instructors and add more full-time faculty. The goal is to improve the instructional quality and expand educational opportunities throughout the technical college system and increase the number of graduates, particularly in the strategic industry programs.